First of all, most of those "billionaire dropouts" were dropouts from Ivy League schools with plenty of startup money from daddy already at their disposal, not dipshits coming out of no-name-high-school. Secondly, most of them only left college when they already had contacts and solid plans (and financing) in place for starting their own businesses. They didn't need degrees because they were going to be hiring *themselves*, not having to worry about some HR department that will toss any non-degree applicants right into the trash.

For most of the non-rich, non-Ivy League assholes like the rest of us--we still need a college degree if we're going to get beyond the front door to any stable job. We're not Mark Zuckerberg or Bill Gates.

Yep. If you drop out with your cash-cow already moo-ving (sorry, had too)... You are taking a huge risk, and just as likely to end up on the street or in your parents basement.

A college degree isn't a surefire way to become rich, or even get a job, but it does improve your odds of at least getting a decent paycheck. The world cannot support everyone being a billionaire entrepreneur - and for those who don't have the ideas, or just get them too late, college is a good way to increase the odds of a decent 'consolation prize' to not being a billionaire entrepreneur.

My guess is that the people promoting this want one thing: cheap, desperate labor, which these dropouts would become, when the majority of them fail to be successful.

Exactly. It is like saying, "you don't need to get a job and work for a living because you can take those last $5 you have and win the lottery with it." Newsflash for them: most people don't win the lottery. Most people can't just drop out of college and become rich either.

Saddling people with soul-crushing debt to pay for an education is a great way to make them desperate. Myself, I went into IT, where my skills and abilities, earned me my current job (and the last 4). They then paid to get me a couple certs. They also pay me well above the median household income, and allow me to work from home, all because I was able to demonstrate my ability. The key is to find a field you don't mind working in that needs workers. Electricians, plumbers, welders, mechanics... the world needs more of these. They make more than most college graduates, after 4 years of getting paid instead of paying to learn a craft. The ideal that you're espousing, that anyone that doesn't pay for a degree or have rich parents is doomed to fail is complete bollocks. It just takes effort, drive, and a willingness to work for what you want.

It just takes effort, drive, and a willingness to work for what you want.

Thought about using modpoints, decided to pick up on this point instead, just because it's a common and very misleading argument.

Yes, step one to success is effort and drive, as well as having a vision of what you want to achieve. But that's just step one. To take the NBA example for inner city kids: they all believe that all it takes is hard work and determination. Little do they know that millions of others also have that. It also takes athleticism - or at least height - fine motor control and good hand-eye coordination. Actually, to play in the NBA, it takes exceptional levels of at least one of these. If all you have is effort and drive, you will be a side note in your high school's hall of fame. And on top of that, you need luck: don't blow your ACL in high school and get bad care for it. Don't get hit by a bus. Don't be forced to pick of a McDonald's job because you need to support your family in high school. And don't be subject to chronic injuries, for whatever genetic/random reason. See Greg Oden as the poster child for how that can kill your NBA career.

Same thing in tech. If you don't have the brains and ability to absorb code and technical documentation all day long, all your drive and vision won't help. If you can't schmooze people, forget about leading a business. And that's why I think that people like Thiel are well-intentioned, but doing much more harm than good. They're the equivalent of the basketball clinics, but instead of just saying "here, you'll be a better basketball player if you pay us", they're saying "we'll make you an NBA star".

In short: not everyone can be a business mogul, and there's nothing wrong with it. We need to stop telling people that a) they will be if they work hard enough, and b) they're not a business mogul only because they're lazy. Neither of those statements are true, and they're behind a good chunk of the problems the US is facing.

That said....

Electricians, plumbers, welders, mechanics... the world needs more of these. They make more than most college graduates, after 4 years of getting paid instead of paying to learn a craft.

More people should take this to heart. There's nothing wrong with being a blue-collar worker. Some of those jobs pay very well. Notice though: some of them do. You can pull down $150k as a welder, but it's hard, technical work that you won't be doing forever.

Yep. If you drop out with your cash-cow already moo-ving (sorry, had too)... You are taking a huge risk, and just as likely to end up on the street or in your parents basement.

A college degree isn't a surefire way to become rich, or even get a job, but it does improve your odds of at least getting a decent paycheck. The world cannot support everyone being a billionaire entrepreneur - and for those who don't have the ideas, or just get them too late, college is a good way to increase the odds of a decent 'consolation prize' to not being a billionaire entrepreneur.

My guess is that the people promoting this want one thing: cheap, desperate labor, which these dropouts would become, when the majority of them fail to be successful.

A college degree isn't a sure fire way to get rich but it is rather difficult to get rich in the tech industry without people that have a college degree or some other form of higher education. I am really tired of people trash talking college education and then pointing at a selection of cherry-picked individuals like Bill Gates, Zuckerberg, Dell, Jobs etc. as if they somehow constitute conclusive proof of the fact that we can disband our Universities. Now it may very well be that you don't need to be college educated to found a start-up that grows into a multi billion dollar high-tech megacorp but I wonder how far any of these people would have gotten without people that have a college degree? Does Dell rely upon self-educated people to design and manufacture components for their computers? Does Microsoft / Apple software get written by people who learned to program from "Teach your self in 7 days" guides (Ok, sometimes I wonder about those last two but but I happen to know what kind of people work for these two companies and trust me they are mostly educated pros). I think that the likes of Gates, Zuckerberg, Dell, Jobs were just as lucky as they were 'mega talented visionary dropouts' and that applies particularly to the first two. I will give Michael Dell credit for having an natural talent and feel for logistics, and Jobs, whatever else you may think of him, had an uncanny nose for products with great potential (the whole iPod/Phone/Pad line) as well as companies with great potential, like Pixar for example. People thought Jobs was nuts when he bought Pixar.

This has been tried [wikipedia.org], more or less, in a large study spanning over 70 years(!), but without great success: "In his book Fads and foibles in modern sociology and related sciences (p. 70-76), sociologist Pitirim Sorokin criticized the research, showing that Terman's selected group of children with high IQs did about as well as a random group of children selected from similar family backgrounds would have done."

The cherry picking can also be attributed to the times. Remove Zuckerberg, the rest started in the 1970s. Dell was probable the 1980s. Do you think today that if Jobs or Gates were an 18 years old they would have made the same choices? Back then there were no big hardware of software companies. Computers were a new thing. For Jobs and Gates to succeed today, they would need another new thing.

Now that you mention it, people were saying the college degree was a waste of time in the mid-to-late 90s as well, although tech jobs were so plentiful then that they actually were hiring people right out of high school.

Then when the bubble burst, the lucky ones found themselves in a dead end job with no degree. Most of them didn't get to keep the job.

Yes, and this should be the last comment, but every white male douche with any kind of spoon up his ass is going to post with some Ayn Randian explanation of how you're wrong and school is a scam foisted upon unsuspecting saps, while he's doing just fine through hard work and good choices, and the world is better for it, thank you very much.

Emulating Zuckerberg => Silicon Hoop Dreams. Kids, college can be a good investment. So could "uncollege" with MOOCs and/or the IRL startup experience. It fucking depends on you. You should try to objectively evaluate your own situation and ignore pithy counterculture sentiments like "say no to college," because they may not actually apply to you, your potential, your drive, your network of support, or your pocketbook/pursestrings.

That's about the size of it. College is great for some people, military is better for others, entrepreneurship for others, and just getting an entry-level job out of high school for others still. There's no "right path" for everyone. College will provide more opportunities for the vast majority of people (assuming they think about the school and degree they choose before committing), but no, it's not right for everyone. I've seen many people flounder and fail with a college degree, I've seen many people succeed without one and I've seen quite a few put off college until their 30's or later when they've already established themselves in their field of choice (an option many people overlook but it certainly valid).

Let's be honest, the skyrocketing cost of college and debt are very real issues, but a $200,000 bill for a bachelor's degree is extremely rare. Your average state university might be a quarter of that, and the cost can go even lower if one starts at a community or junior college and transfers in.

Now, if you're talking $200,000 for a BA plus the cost of a graduate degree like an MS, M.D, PHD, or JD- that's a completely separate issue as those fields are entirely off limits to those without advanced degrees. "good skills" without the degree won't allow you to practice law, medicine, or teach at a university level.

The article summary also concentrates on the argument that "learning to code" doesn't take a four year degree, and perhaps it doesn't- but the american workforce consists of far more than just coders, and its very likely that if said coders want to advance up the corporate ladder later in their careers, the lack of a degree is going to stop them dead in their tracks. The article fails to note that the unemployment rate for those with just a high school degree is three times higher than those with a bachelor's degree- 12% vs 4% or so. You can't ignore a statistic like that, and a large part of the reason why is that HR departments and Recruiters are in the habit of asking for a BA by default and will automatically trash a resume that lacks it, despite how good one's skills may be.

The "skip college' argument is extremely short sighted here, ignores the realities of the hiring landscape, and is really only useful advice for a very, very small percentage of those looking to start businesses.

Let's be honest, the skyrocketing cost of college and debt are very real issues, but a $200,000 bill for a bachelor's degree is extremely rare. Your average state university might be a quarter of that, and the cost can go even lower if one starts at a community or junior college and transfers in.

The state university I graduated from is now close to $25,000 / year. For IN-STATE residents. And that doesn't include books or any specific lab fees. Now, I might be a product of public higher education, but my math says 4 years of that is $100,000, which is significantly more than a quarter of $200,000. (If you're out-of-state, it's closer to $37,000 per year.) For a degree that is more of a stain on your resume than an asset, I might add. After all, if you had any brains, you wouldn't have had to go to that aggie school out there.

You can't ignore a statistic like that, and a large part of the reason why is that HR departments and Recruiters are in the habit of asking for a BA by default and will automatically trash a resume that lacks it, despite how good one's skills may be.

Skills don't enter that equation at all. Introducing the concept of 'skills' divorced from a degree introduces thought into the equation. Thinking is hard. And, since HR is usually staffed by morons, or so overworked that they aren't physically able to evaluate each resume they receive, they use the lack of degree as a filter to narrow things down.

Anyway, companies don't really care about your skills or education. They look for weaknesses that they can exploit when they're evaluating someone for a job. By exploiting the weaknesses (like, for example, if someone has a family to feed and/or provide health insurance for) they can keep salaries down, which improves the bottom line. It's not about your skills (which nobody but your hiring manager gives a shit about, and that's the reason why they rarely have input in the hiring decision - they want 'good', not 'cheap'), it's about how cheaply they can get you.

What insanely overpriced school is that? Here in California, a State university tuition is 3400 a semester after our most recent increase. At community college I was paying about 500 a semester. After graduating this semester, I'll have managed to pull off only paying 25k out of pocket for 5 years on a CSCI degree with a math minor.

I've seen a few different numbers for "average loans for a Bachelor's degree", but they're pretty much all in the $23-$27k range, which isn't too bad for a ten year loan. The huge six figure numbers are usually the result of bad financial decisions such as repeated deferments, etc. I graduated with about $24000 in loans at the beginning of 2010. As of now, I have $3800 remaining in spite of being paid far below industry average for this area and having an nice townhouse for nearly double the rent of a basic apartment. The main problem most people have is a complete lack of money management. We have a Wii and a handful of games. We subscribe to Netflix but don't have cable and our 32" TV is plenty big enough. Most people make plenty of money to handle student loans, they just handle it poorly. Of course, there are some truly useless degrees out there that aren't worth it (I'm looking at most of you people with a BA) - I just wish a guidance counselor would have the balls to tell students "Are you sure that's the degree you want? It won't net you any more money than you'll make without it"

I don't think Bill Gates used his family money to start up the company. However Bill Gates was (possibly still is) extremely talented.

If you read Idea Man[1] by Paul Allen, Bill Gates sneaked around WSU's computer lab with Paul Allen, fixing PhD students' code. That's before Bill Gates went to Harvard to study a degree in law. If you think you are as capable as Bill Gates, feel free to drop out.

I happen to think that the law degree might have helped Bill Gates in running his company.

First of all, most of those "billionaire dropouts" were dropouts from Ivy League schools with plenty of startup money from daddy already at their disposal, not dipshits coming out of no-name-high-school. Secondly, most of them only left college when they already had contacts and solid plans (and financing) in place for starting their own businesses. They didn't need degrees because they were going to be hiring *themselves*, not having to worry about some HR department that will toss any non-degree applicants right into the trash.

For most of the non-rich, non-Ivy League assholes like the rest of us--we still need a college degree if we're going to get beyond the front door to any stable job. We're not Mark Zuckerberg or Bill Gates.

Your first point is important. Going to college (particularly a well-networked one like Harvard) and dropping out is not the same as never attending. The reason is your second point. You can get what you need from a college without getting a diploma. It is much less likely you'll get what you need (or even know what you can get) if you never attend. It's the old "how do you know you won't like like/need it if you've never tried it?"

To your last point, a kid saying 'I don't need college, look at Zuckerberg,' is kinda like me saying, 'I don't need to work, look at the lady who just won millions playing the lottery.' You may say, the Zuckerbergs of the world are in control of their destiny, the lottery winners rely on luck. I'll say, there are more lottery winners who've won enough to live off the rest of their life (if managed properly) than there are billionaire drop outs.

I went to Harvard and dropped out after my first year not due to having a great startup idea, but having to deal with family issues. I'm also not a trust-fund baby, as neither of my parents has a college degree, my mom's family business was destroyed by a natural distaster when I was a small kid, and my dad has always been a blue-collar worker in a low-paid line of work. My family qualified for food stamps and subsidised lunches but my parents wouldn't take either (and they're dyed-in-the-wool liberal democrats--imagine that). I grew up paying for my own school supplies, field trips, etc., from the money I made selling crops that I grew personally--my dad funded my initial startup in terms of seedstock and about $80 of fertilizer in lieu of allowance for working on the farm.

I started my post-dropout career at a $11/hr job technically classified as temporary field labor. There I helped my boss write a field data collection/productivity app on what was the closest thing to a hand-held tablet (the 2004-version of a CF-07 from Panasonic).

Second move was to a different company as a temp for $20/hr--also still considered field labor but I was expected to be able to operate a gps unit. There I set up their entire GIS system and surrounding business processes from scratch.

Several years later and I'm now in a full-time position (which had been advertised as "MBA + X years experience required") with that second company managing planning for regional operations and developing strategy and processes for a global multi-9-figure operations unit. Working on a degree through University of Phoenix just to get the piece of paper--but even when I do it'll be useless because I'm already at a level that requires at least a masters per formal requirements.

In short, it can be done. That being said, HR fought my initial hire as a full-time employee, and one person even made it her personal mission to limit my promotions and pay and to try to exclude me from consideration for potential promotions. The only reason I advanced the way I did was because my managers personally and specifically fought HR on my behalf. If I had the MBA and hadn't had that resistance from HR I'd be paid double what I'm paid today at the very least.

Here's my advice. If you are willing to start at the bottom, and earn recognition via tangible accomplishments, you can make a career in corporate America without a degree. It will require that you not only outperform your credentialed peers by orders of magnitude, but also build very strong professional relationships on the business management side such that your manager+3 will be willing to boot stomp HR on your behalf. You will in all likelihood still be undercompensated unless you are willing to jump ship and objectively prove your desirability as demonstrated by other companies headhunting you. As that is largely opposed to developing strong relationships with your managers, this is a delicate balancing act. If you are willing and able to do the same while actually having a degree you will earn much more $ at almost any large corporation. Also, do not kid yourself--people actually learn stuff in college, so you have to be willing to actively self-educate in order to be competitive.

If you want to start your own business in an industry that is not heavily credential-sensitive, and you have a capitlization plan that does not involve stuffy bankers and conservative investors, and feel that you can spare 4 - 6 years gaining experience, I absolutely recommend jumping in to industry and reading Drucker, Kaplan and Norton, etc. on your own as opposed to getting a degree. 4 - 6 years in a real career will be much more valuable than a degree once you're your own boss.

If you will "only" be a highly competent and consistent performer looking for a decent, stable job, GET A DEGREE.

You certainly don't need it, but it helps. If it helps enough to compensate the additional time spent on it depends on what you plan to do though. In some areas, for examples, you must have a specific graduation degree to be even allowed in.

I agree that it would be much more sensible and fair if you were always judged by what you know and not by what title you have, but unfortunately that is not always the case.

I agree that it would be much more sensible and fair if you were always judged by what you know and not by what title you have, but unfortunately that is not always the case.

I'd also like to judge people on their ability to think, to listen to others, research existing knowledge, to appraise and weight up ideas, and this is a large part of what college teaches. This goes beyond 'knowing stuff' and 'people skills' (although these are undoubtedly important).

Many colleges are taking seriously the gap (both the perceived one and the real one) that has emerged between curriculum and the needs of employers, balancing it with the need for well-rounded education/experience both inside and outside of the workplace, and engaging in initiatives to adapt their programs. In fact, where I work it is the Big Thing(TM) being pushed from the top.

I won't go so far as to call TFA out as having drunk the Trump cool-aid, I'd just point out that *which* college matters a lot too. There are those that evolve, and those that are behind the curve. It's important for both employers and enrollees to get a feel for which is which.

So is the point of the "college experience" to produce a well-rounded, educated individual, or a worker bee well-suited to what an employer is looking for. A college education used to be the former, and only the wealthy could afford that luxury.

What I'm hearing from the article and this thread is: "people who get a 4-year degree to become software jockeys are stupid, because they should have had the initiative to self-teach."

Some people who go to college later decide that they would rather spend their time developing software, which they happen to be passionate about and rather good at. It is not surprising that those people are successful at doing what they enjoy and are passionate about, but that doesn't mean that everyone else who stayed in college is a chump.

I put myself through college and ended up with ZERO debt. Yes, it was a pain and I ate a hell of a lot of ramen (and oranges, to prevent scurvy), but I not only got my degree, but gained much knowledge in fields outside of my major, which have surprisingly proven to be more valuable than my degree.

In my view, a degree in and of itself means nothing, except that hopefully a person is more well-rounded than some "self-made" person who has a very narrow vision of the world. Like unvaccinated people, people without lateral knowledge are bad for society. Without knowledge of history, sociology, literature, engineering, art, music, science, foreign languages, etc., those people will be little more than idiot-savants.

exactly. what I've noticed from my many friends without college degrees or any education above high school is that they don't like to hear or discuss things. They've fixated on ideas and concepts and that is it. And then they tend to lack critical thinking when issues come up. In general, any secondary education seems to expose people to many different ideas and concepts and it builds critical thinking methods and processes many would not ever get without it.

Not everyone needs a secondary education but it sure helps many. And then there's the lottery.

I'd also like to judge people on their ability to think, to listen to others, research existing knowledge, to appraise and weight up ideas, and this is a large part of what college teaches.

It would be nice if having a college degree was any sort of indicator towards possessing those qualities. Just because a person made it through college and has been exposed (in theory) to those things, it does NOT mean that they actually have any of those qualities.

Listening to others is some fields is a liability instead of an asset.

No, it is not. The ability to listening to others is never a liability. You seem to be confusing "never makes a decision without polling the public, and goes whichever way the wind blows," with "actively seeking out and understanding other peoples' perspectives and input."

There is NO 'anti-social savant programmer' who is better at his job because of his inability to listen to other people. If he functions at a high level, it is because he is smart enough to function at a high level *despite* his handicap, not *because of* his handicap.

No, it's definitely not. Opinions have information. The sign of someone who really knows what they're on about is the person who listens, sifts, and then makes a decision based on that. Listening doesn't mean rule by committee; it just means you're acting with all the information you can get, which leads to a more informed choice.The person that "knows" what to do can get it disastrously wrong, and frequently does.

Translation: "I'm super-smart and everyone I work with is a drooling moron compared to me. They can offer me nothing that I haven't already considered and likely rejected. Everyone is wrong and should listen to me. I know best, after all. I'm a specialist."

Folks, this is what happens when you "Just Say No" to a college education. The autodidact with an over-inflated sense of self-worth and a penchant for misanthropy.

I have the perfect example of that. I applied for a job that required a B.A. in a particular area even though I did not have it because I have a doctorate degree in that field. Well, turns out a friend of my father worked for that company and was the person who made the hiring decision. A few months later, my dad introduced us at a meet and greet and he asked my why I didn't apply. I told him I did and his reply is that he definitely would have remembered seeing a doctorate but all he got to choose from was 5 B.A.s. He found out, after a little digging that tons of people with a B.S. in that area as well as myself and a few other master and doctorate degrees did not even make it onto his desk because the resume scanner threw us all out because we didn't have a B.A. in that field.

These "resume scanner" things are why you'll never find the best and brightest in corp. america. And those that do wind up there, quickly realize their folly. Also, I don't know how to destroy this stereotype myself, but HR are just people folks, they aren't smarter, more superior, or better than anybody, though a lot of those little f'ers act like they are because of how much personal info they're exposed to. A few things to remember here:
I hear HR lady disclosing my SSN randomly, she loses job, I get big settlement.
They can't do anything without permission from higher ups that's not in their limited job scope.
It doesn't require much education to work in HR.

I'm in middle to low-level management. The last two positions I had to hire for (both IT related... one was for a technician, and one was for a technical project manager) had over 1,000 resumes that were submitted to the job posting. We only had our posting online for two weeks.

There is no way I could ever comprehend that many resumes. So, I'm only left to do some filters. First filter is for a college education. Why? It's one clear thing that sets people apart. Sure, I'm throwing away 60% of the people -- many of them who are probably really good, but I have to filter on something.

Next thing I usually filter on is certain technologies. I put a lot of "required" technologies in the job posting. If you aren't smart enough to put those same words into your resume and/or cover letter, you are out. That usually boils down the number of resumes I need to look at to about 120 or so. From there I somehow have to figure out how to not spend the next two months interviewing people.. I usually get about 10 - 12 in the door to an interview.

It's a sad fact, but you have a 88% chance of having your resume NOT hitting my desk. If you are applying for a job, you have to look at the requirements, the posting and every other clue the company gives you to get past the filters. You have to treat applying for a job like a job. Once you get in the door is when you can bedazzle them with your knowledge. The resume is just to get IN the door.

Oh, and I know you personally, that always helps. I will tell you specifically what I am looking for and help you get around the filters. You will still need to stack up to the best of the crop that I'm looking at.

Not in the real world bud, I know a guy who wanted to go back to his college's IT Dept. and work as a tech lead, he knew the IT director, who said he'd green light him if he applied. So he did, HR never passed his resume on because he didn't have the minimum 5 years of experience listed on his resume, what's funny is he did have 5 years of experience. HR wasn't able to decipher it from his resume (his problem) and the resume never made it to the right person, and now somebody else works there.

Also, I can make a strong argument for there's no such thing as a "smart company" that has hiring managers... hiring manager positions are only available at fairly large companies, and there's no such thing as a "smart" corporation.

Most people aren't born with adequate amounts of (1) or (2). That's why they go to college: To get those things.

This whole "skip college, be your own tech mogul" theory sounds like the thousands of inner-city kids who all think that their ticket out of the ghetto is to become an NBA star. Sure, it works for a couple of dozen of lucky people per year, but for the rest, it's an abysmal failure.

The become a tech billionaire thing is exactly like pro sports. Occasionally someone makes it big but the vast majority of people who try are going to end up disappointed, 30, and with nothing to fall back on.

Plus low-skill tech is a maturing industry. Zuckerberg and the app millionaires got in at the beginning. Normally in tech you need a lot more knowledge than they have (or a lot of money, or both). Jobs was a sales genius, backed up by an electronics genius and again, lucky and in the right place at the right time.

The become a tech billionaire thing is exactly like pro sports. Occasionally someone makes it big but the vast majority of people who try are going to end up disappointed, 30, and with nothing to fall back on.

Humorously, you've just described the "higher ed industrial complex", although you forgot to mention due to explosive growth in tuition its now horrifically expensive compared to the expense of becoming a wanna be basketball star.

There's nothing wrong with higher ed, other than costing too much. I like that my coffee barista and waitress both have 4-year degrees. Education gives life meaning, it gives you a lifetime of interesting things to think about, if you bother to pay attention, anyway. The problem with my barista and waitress having 4 year diplomas is they paid WAY too much money and thought they were getting middle class job training, when all they got was debt and an education and no job. If only they could have paid $200/semester like my parents paid for personal enrichment, that would be a perfectly good situation..

There are cheap but excellent schools out there. I paid 12k/year (all-inclusive) for an engineering degree that paid for itself in just one year. The people with all this debt aren't good higher education shoppers, both in terms of school selection but also degree selection. Or maybe they just weren't cut out for getting one of the degrees that actually pays off.

I paid about half a year's starting wage for my degree in computer engineering. I don't think the problem is college, I think the problem is people thinking they have to spend ridiculous sums of money for it.

Wish I could mod you up. I picked up BS, MS, and PhD (why on this last one... I'm not entirely sure) in CS without I or my parents having to pay for it. There are scholarships available for undergrads and assorted "graduate assistant" positions if you continue to the graduate level. The biggest thing most people I've dealt with need to understand is there is nothing wrong with going to a state school.

At the college level your degree is heavily what you make of it. If you want to learn a lot about the field, you can. If you want to skate by and barely do what's required, you can. However, if you interview with for a position and it's clear that you never did anything beyond the basic coursework and never cared enough to dig deeper on anything you're probably not getting a job. Pick a field somewhere in the intersection of "you're interested in it" and "you can get a job in it" and actually apply yourself. Look at the edges of what's taught in school and find bits and pieces that are interesting to you. Learn several programming languages, just so you can see that they're so inter-related that you can pick up whatever the new hotness is well enough to get through a basic interview. Learn some basic desktop IT work along with that CS degree so you could identify how the OS ate itself or what part the magic smoke escaped from and replace it. Learn every trick you can find for debugging tough problems from debuggers, to profilers, to writing your own logging routines, to breaking out wireshark because god only knows what's ACTUALLY traveling over the wires.

None of these things necessarily require a degree but if I were to roll a die on either a programmer who has a degree and one that doesn't, with no other knowledge, my odds of getting someone useful are slanted toward the college degree.

What I get so frustrated by is that there is this mentality that people can somehow "fall back" on a degree. That's bullshit. There are tons of people with degrees and even advanced degrees selling refrigerators at Sears. A degree doesn't magically bestow ANYTHING. People that think they have a degree and somehow get to start a rung higher than someone without one are sadly mistaken as well. One of my best friends used to bitch nonstop about how he had his masters degree, and his boss only had a high school degree. One day after a few beers I had enough of it and said "Look, you went to school for 7 years, he started two businesses after high school, both failed, but he learned a lot from his failures, then went to work making nothing as a call center manager, worked his way up the management chain reading books on it, and going to conferences to get better at it. His trade is management, yours is Java development, and just because he is your boss doesn't mean he automatically makes more money than you. Great developers are harder to hire and fire than great managers." He never said crap about it again.

College now is the high school diploma of years past. It's good, but it's a fairly cheap commodity now. If someone doesn't have one, then they are just missing a cheap commodity.

Yes I have a bachelors degree, and no I don't think it's really helped me at all.

Speaking as a history major, if you go to school for a subject that isn't going to be related to an actual opening in the middle class, you're not going to get a middle class job. That's math that even a barista can do, if they want to.

Don't get me wrong, I like the subject I studied, a lot. It's extremely important to have perspective and know how things were, and not what people tell you they were. On the other hand, if I hadn't had a solid technical background, a tech job in college, and some CS classes, I was looking at being a lawyer, a stockbroker or a waiter.

I really only needed college to get my first job, but it was directly related to getting my first job. You also probably want the degree so you can get into a graduate program. You don't need it, but it may help to get your MBA at some point if you want to be a manager, or at least, an MS in a technical field to move up that track.

I am just going to state, you are going to need a college degree on your resume to get past HR, but I will also say *it doesn't matter where you get it from, if it's accredited* all they care about is your degree being written on your resume after your first job unless it is an academic job. If it's academics, you better have gone to an Ivy League or other notable school and been in a very good graduate program afterward. Otherwise, you're teaching community college, buck-o.

I have an English degree. I had 10 years of IT experience under my belt before I got it however. Strangely enough, my boss made the comment that she picked me over the other folks because I had an English degree. It was kooky enough to make her take a look and take notice of me.

Most people I know don't work in the field they have their degree in. I know physics majors that work in HR. I know math majors who work as executives. I can probably count on one hand the number of people I know who work in the field they got their degrees in when set aside Engineers and Doctors where a specialized education is required.

Hell, these days even law grads go into other fields (mostly politics it seems).

The issue isn't that the barista and waitress paid the money, the issue is that they did it wrong. I advise students on a regular basis at the very beginning of their college careers (right before they go to be exact). I tell every single one the following:

You will hear people tell you that there are good and bad degrees. This isn't inherently true. Some look good on paper, some don't. Some specialize you, some don't. What is important are the connections you make while you're in school, how much you spend on it, and what you want. If you don't spend much money, then sure, get the art history degree - you'll be no worse off financially, you'll have fun and learn some useful skills, and you really won't limit your job prospects at all. BUT, if you're looking at 200K in debt, maybe don't. If you want to grow up to design cars but you're bad at art and don't own/can't afford a computer, don't go to a four year, go technical - be a mechanic and get your hands dirty. Earn some cash and go into design later, once you understand what people really like in cars. If you like computers, but don't really want to learn about the software - be a repairperson - 18 months and you're out, or work for a big-box and take their little training course. If you want to get an English degree and be a writer, great - but be prepared to kiss every professor's ass to make connections, and brace yourself for 20-30 years of bitterness and disappointment.

Again, the issue isn't that kids are going to college in record numbers, or that there are jobs you can do with and without a degree. It's that we have a college-going society who is still early enough in the cycle to remember the days when few people went to college, and a bachelors actually brought you accolades. It's that we have a values structure of "college will get you there" in a "debt will crush you" society. If students had a more realistic assessment of what they can/can't do with a college degree, I think we would be a lot better off. Also, if students had a more realistic view of what they actually have to do in college to apply the art history degree in the future, I believe less would go.

Why are there so many psychology degrees working as waitresses? Because you can coast through that degree, it's interesting and people don't look down on it. Why are there so many baristas with English degrees? Because it's fun, it's easy to coast, and you learn some good skills. Why are there so few psychologists and (good) authors? Because few students take the time to make connections and apply themselves in college to map out their futures.

Honestly, the fault is about 75/25 split between the individual and the school. Schools sell students programs, the government sells students schools, and someone makes money. BUT, students really should be personally responsible for their own futures. A small amount of planning can turn that bullshit English Literature degree into a comfortable, upper-middle class job. (I can attest to that)

At one time, getting a college degree in any field would guarantee middle-class success. There was a sociologist (I forget his name) who wrote a couple of books about that, based on studies of lifetime career progressions of large numbers of people, and that's what he said.

Unfortunately, you have to follow people 50 or 60 years to find out what childhood experiences made them successful, and by the time you get your data, the world has changed. After World War II, a college degree was a ticket to success for a middle-class and especially a working-class kid. It was class mobility. There were businesses that needed a kid who had basic math and physics, and they were willing to train them.

Today we've eliminated a lot of labor, and outsourced a lot more. There's no more class mobility, the lower-class kids are getting stuck, and competition (with China) is driving wages down.

It's worse than pro-sports. In pro-sports, at least, there are amateur leagues in place that do a pretty good job at identifying and developing the best of the best. There's no doubt that Gates and Zuckerberg are talented, but they're talented in the way that pro basketball players were talented in the 1940s. When your selection pool starts out by excluding 99%+ of the population due to lack of wealth or connections, you severly limit the number of superstars you'll be able to find.

There are 320+ million people in the US. Of those about ~1000 of them will 'hit it big in business'. That is about.000003%. Of that ~1000 or so people a small percentage 'dropped out'.

So we are look at anomalies and saying 'this is the way to do it'?

Bill Gates/Zuckerberg dropped out because their business was taking too much of their time to finish. You can 100% bet if they had failed they would have went back and finished.

They were already driven. They had already started something. To say 'dont go at all' is silly. For example Zuckerberg would not have even started facebook if he had not gone. Same for Gates.

I have over the years met maybe 2-3 people who are driven enough to start their own business in that way. I have met hundreds who start them to just 'make money' or dodge taxes in some way.

You also have to have passion about what you are doing. They love making money and screwing someone out of a buck. It takes a certain mindset that most people I have met do not have. Oh sure people like having money (because it buys them things). These guys like just having money and there is never enough.

They are the guys who in highscool is selling pencils, pens, paper, and snacks out of his locker to make some money. Not your average schmo who just wants to graduate and get the hell out of there. He sees an opportunity not a chore. Everyone is a possible customer who will give them money.

Take me for an example. I'm a computer scientist who have also studied financial mathematics (mostly focusing on the problem of pricing derivatives). I probably have at least technical skill (even if one can't very easily be sure of that, trying to assess it oneself). However, until I finish my thesis and graduate I definitely won't have anything but (perhaps glorified) internships.

The degree really matters. Especially if you want to work in anything in which your professional decisions have consequences for people- like in finance, engineering, medicine, aerospace, or almost anything interesting or technical.

I agree a GREAT deal with what you said....but it mostly applies to people that have a little resume experience under their belt already.

If you're going to work to start your own business, no, you don't need a college degree.

However, for most "real" jobs, starting out....especially in tech, but most any field I know of, if you don't have at least a bachelors degree in something, your resume won't even be evaluated. Sad but true.

Today, the bachelors resume is what a few decades ago, a HS diploma was....it is the first weed out requirement for most any job.

There are exceptions to the rule, but I posit in the real world out there today, very few exceptions. A college degree and contacts are your best two weapons to get your foot in the door.

But once in that interview....and going foward with the job, I can tell you that often great people skills will put you ahead of people that are strictly tech skills.

You still see the stereotype of tech types being somewhat introverted and uncomfortable even holding non-formal conversations with their co-workers and bosses. If you have a good personality, gift of gab, and enough intelligence to know most of what your doing, that will take you a LONG way in your professional career.

2) People Skills - The skills to actually talk to people and convince them that you're not an idiot. Convincing people that you're worth the time and the money is the 2nd most important skill you can have.

I'm making more money than all of my 4-year degree friends because I decided long ago to educate myself in a field that's likely to GROW (and not things like art history, where you go to school just to teach other kids, so they can teach other kids, and so on) and because I can talk to people and have them see me as an asset and not a potential liability.

So really you need at least three things - the two you numbered above, plus

3) A desire to work in a field where money is thrown at anyone, not just college graduates.

Your number 3 is spot on. Programming is more or less code monkey work. Businesses are increasing asking for domain knowledge of some field to which programming is applied. Most of those fields require a college degree.

Without that degree, or some other paper, you aren't "qualified" for shit as far as HR is concerned. There are 50 other people who do have the certification they want. Unless you (or, more likely, your parents) have good connections you don't get past that filter. The best bet is to work at both education and connections at the same time.

I'm making more money than all of my 4-year degree friends because I decided long ago to educate myself in a field that's likely to GROW...

And this is the problem right here. A college education is not a four year technical school. If the only thing you go to college for is to get trained in a field where you make money, by all means don't bother.

A college education is an investment in becoming an educated human being trained in disciplined critical thinking and broadly knowledgeable about the world. It is not job training. While being an educated human being should help your job prospects, if that is all you focus on you have missed the point.

But it may be that, in turning our economy over to the aristocrats, the "1%", we have created a situation where educated human beings are no longer in demand in the job market.

And it's certainly the case that in reducing government support of education, we have not only fantastically increased student debt and transferred yet more wealth to the capitialist class, but have made education less available -- thus decreasing the proles understanding of how they're being shafted by the aristocrats.

2) People Skills - The skills to actually talk to people and convince them that you're not an idiot. Convincing people that you're worth the time and the money is the 2nd most important skill you can have.

Absolutely; however, if you never get the chance to talk to someone, does it really matter?

I am in a similar position to you: No degree and making much more than most of my "friends" who did get a four year degree. Let's be real here, there was a large chunk of luck involved to even get where we are regardless of the primary two skills that you listed.

FWIW I've been in "discuss the candidate" meetings where the powers that be decided not to hire a guy not because he didn't have a degree, but because he didn't have the right degree. And he was already working in the field and interviewed fairly well. I suspect that if he lacked a degree altogether he wouldn't even have made it to the interview phase. Could someone without a degree do the job he was interviewing for? Most definitely. But signalling matters. The trend may be that its importance is decreasing, but plenty of employers still "care" about degrees that (IMO) it's worth getting one, if only to increase the "surface area" of employers who'll consider you.

I’m all for the elimination of college/university as an almost necessity to get a decent job.

That said, for every tech millionaire dropout, there are probably 1000 guys with good technical knowledge eking out a living on a hell desk. At a minimum, not having a degree is going to make things harder and reduce your options. Again, for every small startup you can wow with your cool open source contributions, there's a dozen companies who will just shredder your resume (and before you say "who wants to work for such a company", keep in mind HR is usually not reflective of the working environment at most places).

Much as it sucks, I still think the best bet is to learn on your own, then sweat out the degree.

Then again, here in Canada tuitions are high but not insane. I worked a McJob part time through highschool, full time through summers, and was able to pay off the remainder of my debt fairly quickly after graduating.

There is also something to be said about college/university as a good thing. It forces you to take stuff you’d have no interest in otherwise, there is some social development, you learn to deal with different personalities, etc..

Some people have entrepreneurial drive, some don’t and probably never will. I am one without. I have no interest in starting my own business and no serious career ambition.

That said I make one hell of a wage slave. I love what I do, and I get shit done.

I guess my point is that college isn’t so much about learning to "knuckle under and get stuff done" as a required part of the process for us that lack the drive to go out and do our own thing and instead just want to get a job working for someone else and do the thing we are good at.

One thing college proves is that you have the drive to stick with something for 4 years and succeed. You learn a whole lot of other valuable lessons and information while doing that too.

Look, I'm not a fan of rising tuition costs, and the growing requirement for manufacturing jobs, that clearly have no need, requiring a college degree. But we need to stop encouraging people to be stupid and give up while insinuating that they're doing the right thing. They're not. As mentioned most of the drop outs already had lots of contacts, maybe a good idea, and mommy and daddy's money to carry them. Most of us don't.

Instead, maybe they should get a degree and use their new found skills and insight into the system to help reform it and make it better for everyone. The message certainly should not be to ignore the broken system and subscribe to a life of indifference and complacency. That message is crap served with a steaming side of bullshit.

The unemployment rate for college grads is half that of non-college grads. Yes, there are these billionaire dropouts, but they are the exception not the rule. Besides, if you're capable of having a billion dollar idea without a college degree, aren't you just as capable of having a billion dollar idea WITH a college degree? Why take the risk? Stay in school and have the best of both worlds.

Besides, if you're capable of having a billion dollar idea without a college degree, aren't you just as capable of having a billion dollar idea WITH a college degree? Why take the risk?

Because a college degree costs six figures? RTFA much? Colleges are the next bubble to pop. They've had sustained 10-15% increases in tuition for more than a decade. It is now 4 times more expensive to get a degree than it was when I went to school 15 years ago. The worst of it is that these kids can't default on their student loans. It's unprecedented predatory lending by Sallie Mae and friends. But just like those AAA rated housing bonds, it won't matter if the kids have no job to pay it back. Kids coming out of college today with $100,000+ in debt are a lost generation. They're now on the hook for 30 years for that 4 year party experience. The university towns are going to implode BTW. If you live in one, you might want to sell now and relocate while prices are still high.

TFA doesn't say give up on education. There's coursera, udacity, udemy and others steping up to make education affordable again. TFA says don't be screwed by going to college. lrn2read

Correction: Some colleges cost six figures. There are many paths to a degree which cost less than 50 grand out of pocket. At the time, my undergraduate university had the top tuition in the nation ($35k per year + room and board), and I graduated with a total of $30k in government subsidized (government pays interest while I'm in school) loans. I did this through merit based scholarships, need based grants (1/2 off tuition), work study, living off campus with roommates, cooking for myself instead of using the meal plan, taking the bus to school instead of driving a car, and working part time on the side.

Other paths to a cheap education include:

*Start at a community college and transfer credits to a state school

*Go to an in state college, especially a satellite campus

*Go to a state college other than Big State U with the expensive football team and partyschool reputation. Here in PA Penn State is that school and it actually can be very expensive if you go to the main campus, but we have other state-run colleges here which are much cheaper.

*Go in with a plan: Don't spend 2 years not knowing what you want to do and finally settle, ending up with a total of 5-6 years. Get in there, do it right, and get out.

*Choose a 3 year or accelerated program, and get a 4 year degree for the price of 3 years.

*Choose a major with job prospects. Math, science, and engineering are all worth the money, even if you spend 6 figures because a) it's the best way to learn the field and b) you'll pay off the loans with a job, even in this down economy all my STEM friends got jobs after college. Art, English, and drama... maybe not so much.

*Take time off before you go to college to work and save for your education. It will cost a lot less than having to take out loans.

*Choose a college that offers a fifth year masters if for free. Many schools do this, which basically saves you $20k - $30k and you leave more qualified with the potential for a higher starting salary.

Any one of these methods I've outlined can lead to a college degree at a fraction of six figures. Sure, it means you're not going to the most expensive brand name. Sure it means having to worry about your grades or risk losing your scholarship. Sure it means working after you get out of class instead of partying. But you'll probably actually grow up of the course of the 4 years by taking some personal responsibility, instead treating college like an extension of your adolescence and leaving as a twenty-something with the mentality of a high school teenager like most college grads.

Tell that first mover story to Altair, Compuserver, Altavista, Netscape, AOL, Friendster, Myspace....

There have been many studies in many industries that show that there isn't any inherent first mover advantage. In fact, there is more advantange in being a fast-follower (market is already evident, finding/stealing customers, raising money and hiring good people is easier).

The general average over all industries for first movers that caputured more than 50% pre-mass-market share is a 60% failure rate (50% for tech, 70% for others). The long-term first mover mass market share averaged a mere 5% (6% for tech). And these studies don't count the failure rate for those first movers that don't even reach the success level to capture more than 50% pre-mass-market share, or those that failed because the mass market didn't materialize.

Ideas are a dime a dozen, the ability to execute those ideas are the keys to success... Maybe you don't need college to develop the abilites to execute those ideas (and I don't just mean writing code, you have to run a business, raise money, etc.) that but don't throw away college just to be a first mover... The odds aren't necessarily with you.

On the other hand, if you think you can out-smart someone that currently has something going in a market, perhaps that's something to think about chasing quickly... That's the real story behind people like Bill Gates. There were many incumbents in that OS market, before Microsoft stepped in. Just tell that Bill Gates first mover story to Gary Kildall (and his predecessors)...

This comes from the same mentality as people who skip vaccinating their children: we have a generation who grew up taking things for granted, so they feel free to reject the very things that gave them that privilege. Grow up without being surrounded by disease, and it feels safe to throw away vaccines. Grow up taking an educated populace for granted, and it feels safe to throw away college.

It's also the same mentality that leads people to stop taking medications. I've seen so many people with seizure disorders stop taking their pills after a time because they don't have seizures anymore..... then immediately have seizures again. I know one person that died as a result of this.

As a person who has gone to college, dropped out, and is now going back, I understand the value of the education and experience. It's not for everyone, but it really does have immense value. Very few people have the disposition and dedication to focus themselves and spend their time doing something better than college - most who drop out or don't go will spend their time doing something far less valuable.

See, but if you went to college you would learn that outliers exist in all populations. One should not make conclusions based on an outlier because they do not provide significant evidence for a result. If instead you look at the vast majority of successful people they have college degrees.
That being said there is evidence that certain programs such as vocational or even Ivy League programs have negative effects of certain subsets of the work force. But let's try not to make grandiose claims on faulty evidence.

or NBA, or music, etc, etc, etc
The VAST majority of people who skip college will never achieve anywhere near the financial level they could have achieved by going to school. Skipping college and becoming a billionaire is akin to being the lead point scorer in the NBA without ever playing in college. Yes, it happens, to one person out of millions that play basketball.

Up here in Canuckistan, 'college' means Community College. Community Colleges are mandated (in Ontario at least) to serve the local job market. That means that if there aren't jobs in a particular field, there should not be a college program.

In other words, if you attend a community college, you have a very good chance of getting a job. Some programs have 100% job placement year after year. The statistics are available, you can check the graduate placement and starting salaries before you enrol.

In my particular program, we often get university graduates who can't get jobs. Community Colleges don't get nearly enough respect.

Just what we need, more shitty code for someone else to figure out how to work around the problems created by said code.

Considering the amount of work I spend every day fixing issues or trying to resolve problems due to bad coding from multi-million dollar companies, the last thing we need is more people shoveling out more shit when there is enough shit already out there.

Yeah, I don't know how this happens. I mean, I know how it happens... you go to a school on the East Coast so you have the name on your resume. I went to the University of Minnesota in the Twin Cities for four years and came out with $20,000 in loans (worked three jobs in college). A coworker's cousin just graduated from George Washington in DC and came out with $250,000 in loans. Tuition rates at the University of Minnesota [umn.edu] versus tuition rates at GWU [gwu.edu] (note that those are per credit hour! and they don't give you every credit over 13 free like they do at the U of MN).

Frankly, I think this article should be titled, "skip the overly expensive college because you'll get a more than adequate education somewhere else." Okay so I have to prove myself in an interview over someone from GWU. Challenge accepted.

And if everyone drops out of college to start their own thing, who are you going to be hiring when your startup needs to transition to a medium to large company? Other dropouts whose ideas were crap. Are you sure you want to advocate this to be a more widespread phenomenon?

The big-name schools do provide a few benefits:
1. They have more financial aid money available, so there's a decent chance that if you get into, say, Yale, you won't pay even close to the full price. They may even have special programs specifically to help people like you if you're from a historically disadvantaged background (e.g. a scholarship fund set up 50 years ago dedicated to educating people called at the time "Negros").

2. The future movers and shakers are your classmates. If you want friends in high places for cozy patronage jobs, that will help.

3. Everyone around you will think you're brilliant with no other proof whatsoever. For example, my sister went to an Ivy League school, and many of her classmates were hired right out of school to work in "consulting", which is basically a job of traveling around the US giving Powerpoint presentations on topics they knew little to nothing about. They got the jobs specifically due to their Ivy League education.

So basically your defense of these overly expensive schools is nepotism, dumbshits at the top of the pyramid and other horrors of what is wrong with America? Got it. Also I find it amusing that "you need money to make money" also applies to college... "you need money to be unquestionably paid lots of money." This should be closer to a meritocracy not a country of "daddy has contacts."

Also, to invalidate your first point, the article starts with the premise that everyone is coming away $200,000 in debt unless you drop out or skip college so, no, apparently not everyone gets Yale at reduced price. And if $200,000 is the "reduced" price, you should asked to be kissed first.

Please, do tell of all those Silicon Valley kids who didn't make it. Or the drop-outs who didn't go into CS? How do they get their foot in the door with HR? Those kids who "made it" were very bright to begin with, and they had an opportunity they couldn't pass up by the time they dropped out. What the article is saying is if you drop out, opportunities will come - that's the mentality of every actor trying to "make it" in Hollywood.

I have a certain set of skill that unfortunately aren't too profitable. I'm not in CS nor in dog-walking (as the article suggests). I don't have the aptitude to be a cop. But my skills require a college degree to get my foot in the door. The problem isn't college, but the HR system. And unfortunately, I'm not as bright as Bill Gates or Zuckerberg (both who went to Harvard) to make up the diploma deficit with talent. I went to a state university and as the world goes, pretty average.

What annoys me the most of all, are the examples cited in the article. I bet most, if not all, the kids came from an affluent background, where if they fail there would be a financial safety net from the parents. As for me, I saved up and only had one shot. I tried my hand and didn't make it. My life has changed now where I'd have to save up again for a couple of years for another shot in entrepreneurial career success or start a family.

God, I hate articles like these. It just feeds into every high school kids' fantasies into never going to college and think they can make it big. Opportunity follows talent, not the other way around.

It's amusing that people would advocate this when statistics show that college graduates not only face a lower unemployment rate, but they average higher incomes as well.

As others have pointed out, you'll notice that the successful entrepreneurs who dropped out either went to ivy league schools or had wealthy parents. Even if they had to scrape for their own money, their backgrounds conferred instant confidence in their abilities amongst anyone they approached. One of the most important aspects of a successful business, contacts, where there from the start.

A second important factor here is that these guys were already actively engaged in whatever lead to their success. They would have been successful just the same had they completed college because the drive was already there. These aren't random students more interested in partying than schoolwork. But sure, let's perpetuate the idea that we don't need college so that we end up with an even bigger group of resentful individuals resentful for not having been multimillionaires.

Of course, we should be talking about the cost of an education. College tuition is seriously overpriced but instead everyone harps on student loans. And the government backing those loans simply adds fuel to the fire, creating a massive bubble. Certainly, we should be looking at trade schools, but I think the real problem in the US is perception. Most people think trade schools are beneath them. But when you've got MBA's sucking everyone else dry in a race to bottom, who can blame them?

Let's look at the vast majority of people who haven't gone to college and be inspired by them. This is like saying that the 2 people who won $250M each in the lottery should inspire us all to spend all of our disposable cash on lottery tickets. Statistically your chances of becoming rich as a professional athlete are probably better than becoming Bill Gates or Zuckerman. Oh, not to mention, both of them were in college, and without it and the resources that were available to them because of that neither would have what they have now.

Wait! I have a better idea to avoid $200K of loans. Don't go to an overpriced private school; do go to a good state school. Get a major in a technical area where you can work on internships or co-op often to cover a good portion of your tuition. Get an automatic job offer when you graduate from your co-op / internship company.

Bill Gates had Steve Ballmer who also went to harvard and made lots of contactsZuck hired a hardvard educated COOMichael Dell also hired a college educated COO when it was time to really grow the company

same with all the other startups that made it big. they all hired college educated senior officers, gave up a lot of control and ownership in the company to have it grow. writing up some code on the weekends and renting space on amazon isn't going to turn your startup into a billion dollar company

running a startup without someone who knows how to grow the company means you will always be some small fry and never make it

If you are taking on $200,000 for a 4-year degree, you're doing it wrong. While it is increasingly more difficult every year to work your way through college (as I did), nobody should need to take on this much debt for a 4-year degree. Likely someone taking on that much debt is living way outside their means.

As many other posters have eloquently put, the value of college for most of us is priceless. Very few of us have the entrepreneurial spirit. For every successful entrepreneur or 'self made millionaire', there are thousands who did not make the cut. In a winner takes all society, we forget the majority and we focus on the minority and aspire to be a part of that rarefied circle. This is at best wishful thinking, and at worst will have disastrous consequences to ones morale, prospects, motivation and energy. This is what the guy who says "in Silicon Valley, being a drop out is a badge of honour" fails to notice.

The actual issue is 'cost of college'. There is no reason - absolutely no reason - for a four year degree to cost more than $20 or $30K without scholarship or stipends. The classic American aphorism "follow the money" should be applied to find out "why college costs a bomb"? You will end up in the door steps of American government, lending agencies, universities becoming a profit centre and other vested interests.

Americans should fight "cost of college education", not "value of college education".

Basing a decision not to get a degree on outliers like Zuckerberg and Gates is pretty dumb. Some thoughts:

1. People who are highly successful sans-degree would likely also be highly successful with a degree. The lack of a degree did not juice their success; they succeeded despite a lack of credentials.

2. Choosing not to get a degree creates a much crappier "worst case" compared to getting a degree (a. from a reputable institution, b. in a marketable field and c. with decent grades). Many more non-college-graduates experience this worst case than wind up like Zuckerberg.

3. College needn't cost $200,000. Especially if you're the sort of high-achieving person who is likely to be successful even without a degree. If you're paying $200,000 for a degree you're most likely attending a private university and have wealthy parents. My household earns more than 85% of households; my kid would pay $15k/year to attend Harvard. Paying full price at a top 25 public in-state university would run $10k/year. Toss on a national merit scholarship and we're looking at ~$5k/year. Depending on the field of study that could be earned back via paid co-ops during the final two years.

You don't need college if you're going to compete with $1/hr third world labor. You just need the ability to work 16 hours a day and not ask questions.

You don't need college, son, but we've got a dormitory waiting for you.

The past year, I've been reading a lot of these "You don't need college" stories, mostly in right-wing and pro-corporate media. I don't think it's coincidental.

Nobody is telling Mitt Romney's kid that he doesn't need college, even though (guess what) he REALLY doesn't need college. In fact, it's one of the trending memes of 2012: "You fucking proles don't need college because there are pictures of cheeseburgers on the cash register buttons."

Yes, there are a lot of examples of people becoming successful without a degree, but there is MORE examples of people living on the streets because they don't have a diploma and cannot find work, or are working their asses off just to barely scrape by.

To say that college is completely a waste of time and money is just plain irresponsible. There are far more career paths that must begin with a diploma then those that can start by being self taught. Even in software development just because you can code doesn't mean you are good at it, and there are far more skills learned in school then just how to code, such as better problem solving skills, social and organizational skills.

College is a 4 years sacrifice that prepares you for a 40 year career.

A generation of kids not going to school because of schmucks like this telling them they don't need a diploma to get a job will be the last nail in the coffin that is the decline of the USA into a 3rd world country. An entire generation of kids thinking they can get rich quick without education and instead saturating the welfare system and social assistance programs will bankrupt the government and force more American companies to use outsourcing solutions.

In order to drop out of Harvard or Princeton and start your own (hugely) successful company, you first have to get accepted to, attend, and pay for the aforementioned schools. You just might already have a leg up on the majority of potential entrepreneurial dropouts.

I dropped out of college (electrical engineering) after a year and a half and have had a very successful career in the twenty years since, both in my own companies, and working at others.

That doesn't mean this is the path for everyone. This is not an invitation to every slacker on the face of the planet to drop out of school and keep smoking weed because "the man's" diploma isn't worth anything. I worked very long and hard before, during and after college, perusing engineering and computer science interests.

In the end - College didn't fit my learning style: Hands on, highly practical, very project-oriented. Combining my need for that with my ADD, meant I learn much better staying up all night tinkering in a lab working on my own projects, than sitting in some lecture hall for a mandatory "humanities" course on "Modern European History". I still read books at home at night on DSP and Theoretical Physics.

I also think the analogy to people like Gates or Zuckerburg is stupid. There is a one in a billion chance of doing something like that - but when correctly executed for the correct individual, a VERY good chance that they would have a very good career, rivaling those of a [typical/average] college grade.

They forget to mention that one of the best parts of college, apart from being introduced to new things (not necessarily taught new things, but shown that they exist so you can look into them yourself in your spare time), is networking. During my upper division coursework, I've spent far longer at the bar than I should have, but that time at the bar has been with guys from my computer science classes and we've discussed a lot of ideas, brought in our laptops and worked on some awesome things (released an Android game recently that was programmed 100% at the bar, and usually after a drink or two. Comments galore so I could keep track of my thoughts >.>). You meet people that are _awesome_ at things that you barely grasp, and vice versa. You make friends and team up and work on projects that would take you far longer on your own than if you hadn't collaborated and met people along the way. Example: I generally handle a lot of the Android, web and database stuff for my group of friends, whereas another guy handles circuitry if we want to do something with the Audrino, and is awesome at C and 80x86 assembly, and the last guy is _great_ with math and algorithms for making things "just work."